Fish n Caribou

Well, shuks, I cant get the vid to take......Fact is we have Caribou, and 400,000 following in this Herd alone.
The Western Arctic Caribou Herd WACH is awsome, and its comming to this village SOON.

Hopefully Ill get back in motion with a resupply of parts we traded a scrimshaw for , to a taecher 'round here.
Caribou are southbound, and comming through at the end of this month , but for now the lead Cows are blazing trails that others will follow, and I will hunt..... a huge hunt I cant wait for , so the bro inlaw and I are building storage racks outside in anticipation...........
I just love the intense, quick, high yeild hunt that plays out like it has for thousands of years......

Nets kept us fed, and with variety.
Itook some cool vids boating and checking net.......I gotta make smaller vids, like a minute or so....maby I make them too long? The net checking was cool, Carol filmed with her 8 year old comments and all ~~LOL!!~~ Ill see if I can edit them down to smaller segments next time, as I guess thats the problem here......


Boiled Whitefish with eggs and innerd's
fryed Tiktallik
Yours truly facing an 11pm sun.........

Been fishing and moving about, mostly spotting and killing a few trees (They run so fast) for firewoods for winter. Just gotta hope some other fellas don't get to end first.
Dry standing , they will be great to go at the end of November when the ice is thick enough.
The prop tooka dump by disentigrating the thrush washer and eating into my driveshaft holder. ~~LOL!!~~ More parts....

Thinking about it, I need a chainsaw. All this ax work is for young men..........

Kinda interesting when this happens...

So the wife has sewn many things, often parkas and odd stuff.




Heres a couple examples;
This ones for little girls a picture taken while it was under construction.
Grown woman with Seal skin pants and Seal boots, Caribou Parkee.

The oldest sons Caribou parkee with Polar Bear trim and a snow cover. Also has Arctic Fox mittens. Little Hunters best gear.

Tinmiaq, our oldest daughter when she was about 6, in her Caribou Fawn Parkee at our little red house. It had rather dark hood sides and chest gores, but she haddent many white bellys to use for some reason that year, so she used a darker belly. Still looked good.

That same Caribou Fawn Parkee in the Smithsonian Collection, in the Arctic Studies Display on loan to the Anchorage Museum...................

Pretty cool when something like that happens, thought I'd share.

Yes!! Vids again.....

Yes, we have Vid ........

Soooooo, to test such equipment one must go to the feild, which for us was across the river to clean and repair our racks for Salmon soon again, when the weather cools and the rain ceases.

Papa cleaned up the maggots from a string of fish heads that had been dryed as dog food, and had been dragged under the rack to be eaten. In the last two days something had helped itself to the rancid seal oil and fishheads/backbones that were stored there. Yukkkkkk..........

The wifes Uncle passed away, and shes gearing up for that. Lots to do, many to visit with, eat with and mourn. It takes days.

I'm glad I didnt break any long bones, as both times I have, My arm, then my ribs, my friend Paul arrives for a stay and more relatives die...No, just kidding, but then again, not....!!( I need a smile face a winking here ~~LOL!!~~)

The fact is ,besides studing the weirdness of the emotional Arctic, he did some digging while here, an Arctic Death tradition, 'cause someones gonna dig yer grave someday, for you..........I wonder where he is......Irishman? You best come around again.........someday.......eh?

So , being as I spent the day about the house and the kids in school, I got the youngers in the boat as soon as they escaped the confines of the school. Was easy though, I just told one to meet me there and the others follow'd ~~LOL!!~~

Ended up that my thrmostat is tits up and Im in the market for another. I just unwrenched it and rode without, and I really rode, as the second oldest daughter is our official driver now, and fast learning the fishing/travling trade. Good for me, I can watch 1,000% better when Im riding, not driving... Seems she preferrs it to after school activitys that the other kids do, sports and such, and thats probly better in the long run.

The Motor sooon hummed and we brought a rifle to get a Moose or Caribou, but saw neither, just a big ol' Wolf rather suddenly, trotting off the sandbar to the willows as we came around the bend, returning to Noorvik.

Pretty cool when we see them in summer, all slim and no good coat, just sleek and muscled.

Cant wait till November to trak him down.

No fish in the net either , on our way back home, but theres tomarrow.......

Twitching fresh Salmon.......Yep.

Odd shots

Got a camera up and going, yes, I'm scamming the kids, but what the heck, they're in school again...........and I can take vids, now that I'm home, with a bigger 2gig card, insted of the 32 bit it came with.
So ,out of general curiosity, I tookalook at the pix on the card and there were some I took, and some others took, yet unseen.
Cameras die in my possesion, its sad.
Oddly enough there are pix taken this summer so I posted the unblurred

Just in time, Im thinking~~LOL!!~~

Heres one with a couple Caribou back straps, as we remove them from the carcass, and then seperate the sinew from the meats by pushing off the meat with the back side of the knife. Good clean seperation, leaving pure meat from the loins and sinew to use.

Whitefish and a few Pike, musta been a nice day.


One of many~~LOL!!~~theis one was packed out on my back and the willows are used to tie the front and back legs as hand holds

A VERY nice Oogruk. Probly about 700 lbs, and 1/2 was the weight of the blubber alone. Partner Chuck there, and friend Jeremy too.

The oil is tasty and the skin is to become another canvas for the wife. Its currently taking up space on the skin strecher at the shop, getting soaked in dawn dishsoap, so we can remove the deepest oils and tan it proper White.

This was at the beginning of July.

Me myself and my rifle on one of our many sunny hot days this Summer.

My bro inlaw took some of these, others were the kids. But still a bit here and a bit there, it keeps us fed. The wife will get into serious fishing soon, as she puts up fish during the cool insect free evenings and the fish dry well enough to be insect proof.

Yep, were sliding into Fall and things are changing, especcially with Darkness coming on, the colors about the land are most noticable in veiw.

Fall storm time is comming too, with beach erosion watches tonight and tomarrow, Fishing for Mammoth will be a good prospect soon. Fall Moose and Caribou are always at hand as well, I need to strech out the legs a bit and walk some mud.......Hopefully the wife will return soon so we can go~~LOL!!~~ Nawww, The winds gotta die so I can go to Her....

Yaaaaaa...........

Hey, how ya been?

Well as far as I know, Im doing fine.
Been in Kotzebue a few days, getting into a training session on Volenteer Firefighter recruitment and retention class as we form a better Fire department at home.
Earlier this year, our Chief went for training and procured a "Code red" box,with fire repression tank and a cart that is heated and usable in mid winter as a first assault untill we can rig something up off the city water pipes that run above ground, but have points where we can attach hoses, if the match one of three sizes or attaching clasp/threads. Thats a mess were gonna get changed to a uniform size with adapters so the City can flush with their equipment.
As well, our Chief on this round scooped up more equipment from our Borough.

I spent a further day in meetings as I am on our Borough disaster planning commision, and over the last 1/2 a year this has tied in very well to what Im doing at home with the Fire dept., so I have a better idea how to accomplish it. As well, our Safety Officer is our Search and Rescue prez, and thats a most excellent way to get us all working together.
Next round were gonna have a "Who is in charge here" training.
We figured out that as Chief, Jeff is in charge of all 'Normal' fires, and I being Vice Chief, an involved when its a fire concerning prostitution, extortion, gambling Marijuana Grows or bootlegging. ~~LOL!!!~~
Were actually getting somewhere though and its one of my "Hobbies"

Beside that, the wife is a "Postal Relief" in the region, filling in when desperatly needed. Most Posts are one person affairs, so if a lady busts a leg, often the wife is on the next flight. Not all the time, but every few months of a week or two here or there, rather random and unexpected. Well Kotzebue went from 5 to two, with the wife now as one of those two. Lotta sorting work there, paperwork, front desk.......
This is the "Hub" and all mail gos through here (Im in Kotzebue~~LOL!!~~) and gets distributed among the 9 villages in this vast region.
Were beyond the end of the road.

Put 1+1 and got 1 running 4 stroke Honda 15 hrs. Finnallllllllllllllllyyyyyyyyyy!!!!!

So if I dont blow it up or burn it down, I'll get along well and though slow, definitly better than walking!

fishing wise, I called home today and they are still fishing. Theres been a death, so they put out the net they took out ysterday so the fish can go to the incomming familys who attend the funeral. Most right now are being dry'd for dog food for this winter.

Been knocking off a few Caribou myself, as the skins are prime now for clothing. 6 over the last couple weeks, though we've had to fight mold with the dry'd meat because of the rain and damp foggy weather.
With our lack of snow cover, and the heat of the year, plants have had a great grow season. Big leaves, plenty of Onions, Sourdox and Blueberrys ripening early with rains (weather I like 'em or not) , man this is an easy summer.
I'm liking it.....besides, it was this time last year I over the pain of a right broken arm, and am I greatful that I'm healthy.
I really, badly, super badly wanted to hunt Musk ox, but the winds, waves kept me back and after calling the oldest son its apparent that rut is coming on 'cause he smelled it in the air among the Ox as well as a couple hunters who had bagged 'spiced' Ox. His box of meats to the home was good enough , and it took out the "bummer" and just had me put it off till winter. ~~LOL!!~~ Jan 1st isnt that far any way, we used to wait until March15th.

So maby I'll get a Moose...maby....The wife has the freezer full of Berries and not much room for meat, so we have to think of drying that as well. I do tire of dry'd meats, but with all the heat we've had, (I swear its the second hot as hell summer inna row) we know our berrys would spoil between the two. So dry the meat ~~LOL!!~~ Maby smoke the Moose.?????

Ducks are flying again, their new feathers are working and very soon, the young Geese of the year will be flying slow low and curious, fat from the Summer and they are what we call "Flying Drumsticks" because untill now they have been walking all their lives.
Might have to chase the massed male Ocean Ducks soon, if the weather calms.This Kotzebue is a good place to work out of , along the ocean, and plenty of Caribou skirt the ocean shores too.

Well, I gotta go, things are getting "interesting" and hopefully I come into possession of a camera before the next post.